Chris Hinton Slides Into Your DMs

ESPN released their initial Junior 300 for the 2019 class, and they're a major outlier for Michigan's top commit, five-star defensive lineman Chris Hinton. They rank Hinton, who's no lower than 14th overall and 2nd among SDEs on the other three sites, at 97th overall and 9th among DTs, with the rationale that they believe he's a better prospect on the offensive line:

Highly touted Hinton should switch to offense
Defensive tackle Christopher Hinton is the son of a former All-Pro offensive linemen. The younger Hinton should follow in his father's footsteps and switch to OL. The four-star Michigan commit is a stout run-defender, but defensively he would be more of role player and run stopper. As an OL, he possesses good flexibility, feet and a frame that can support more size and on that side of the ball, by contrast he can be an excellent, "full-time" player.

Many prospects would ignore this perceived slight or lash out at the site in question. Hinton chose a different tack and went straight to the source to see how he could improve:

ATTN: All prospects--this is called maturity, perspective, respect & willingness to handle coaching. A top 100 player in ESPNJr300. pic.twitter.com/gucc5brt9a

Get ready for a lot of Fox. I'm still a little leery of FOX broadcasting a bunch of Big Ten games because their coverage feels somehow wrong. I can't explain why. They've cut back on the robots and band shots but it doesn't feel that college-y, I guess?

Fox and FS1 will be the home of 24 – 27 football games, nine of which will be aired in primetime. Fox will air the football championship game every season.

You’ll see 39-47 men’s basketball games on Fox/FS1 with as many as ten aired on Fox.

Fox will have the first priority of games for much of the football season, although ESPN will get first pick in some weeks. It means you’ll see games like Ohio State-Michigan on Fox rather on ABC.

Michigan is going to be a first pick many weeks. If that means we get Gus Johnson and Joel Klatt or anybody and Spielman I'm totally cool with that.

Metagame moves. Ian Boyd on "confuse and clobber," which is a pretty good name for Harbaugh's approach even if he's not talking about Michigan directly in this piece except when he's referencing Michigan's comical lack of preparation back during the Horror. The bit relevant to the modern day:

The main idea with this style of offense is to use a variety of formations, sweeps, and multiple ball carriers to obscure the fact that the offense is ultimately just blocking a few base run schemes and to provide easy constraints for the offense to punish the defense with. Rather than using the option, the spread, or the passing game to protect the base runs the offense uses confusion.

Maximizing a market inefficiency

It used to be that when people thought about prototypical football players they thought of guys like running backs and fullbacks. Elite, physical runners and big, burly blockers who lived for the contact of the game. But nowadays the game is increasingly dominated by QBs that can process and make decisions under fire and then deliver the ball down the field through the air to receivers who are processing and making decisions on the fly.

It’s not too terribly difficult for a program like Appalachian State or NC State to load up with multiple solid running backs, nor to find blocking fullbacks and tight ends. It’s even possible to find really good ones because they no longer have as much value at the bigger universities that are only looking for TEs that can run routes.

There could probably be some advantage gained by recruiting good tailbacks and then using something like the I-formation, which is no longer common at all, to feed them the ball. That and great defense is more or less how San Diego State has been winning the Mountain West the last few years. However, that’s not what these teams are doing. Instead they’re utilizing even more old school sets like the old Wing-T combined with modern shotgun, pistol, and spread-option tactics to feature multiple ballcarriers at the same time.

Michigan hasn't been going as far as the schools mentioned in this piece, but they've shown little bits and pieces. This was more prominent last year when the T-formation showed up against Maryland and the second ballcarrier was a fullback taking a trap 30 yards; last year the relative unsuitability of the fullbacks meant that on anything except a one yard dive there was only one potential ballcarrier.

I'll be interested to see if that changes this year. The current vibe is that Michigan's going to look like more of a passing spread, but the versatility of Evans and Isaac—while still currently hypothetical—gives them some options to have two potential ballcarriers on the field simultaneously without removing the possibility of having four efficient receivers in the pattern.

Somewhat boring anonymous coach quotes. SI surveys rivals about the top 25 teams and gets a rather tepid set of responses for Michigan. The most interesting bit is further confirmation that Don Brown will get after you:

They’re so aggressive on defense, whether they’re playing man coverage or in their zone packages and third-down stuff. Don Brown is the most aggressive defensive coordinator I’ve seen in a long time. That system has worked for him for 25 years and he keeps tweaking. Now he’s got a lot of high-level talent and depth. You can get some chunk plays against them because of all the man coverage, but you’ve got to finish drives. They’re stingy in the red zone.

This year will be an acid test for the secondary and Brown's approach. Also in things you already knew stated anonymously, Rashan Gary "will be an All-American."

That is good. John Beilein gets shots up. They are good shots:

Ridiculous stat of the day in CBB: Michigan made 77.4 percent of its shots at the rim last season. Can’t remember a number that high.

He said that “88 percent” of teams hammered him for playing too many positions in his college career and not playing his eventual NFL position—safety—enough. (For his part, Peppers said he doesn’t regret where he played because his Wolverines won a lot of games during his tenure.) A typical conversation with teams during predraft meetings, Peppers told me, went like this: “They said, ‘You do everything. You’re here, you’re here, you’re here. We’re going to play you at one position. How can we be sure that you’re going to master this position?’”

You'd think they'd ask Harbaugh about that, and Harbaugh would have sworn up and down that Peppers would pick it all up. He had one year in Don Brown's system and played both safety and SAM. I mean, cumong man.

A couple corrections to the Florida suspensions. When I posted about the seven guys who will miss the Michigan game I said they wouldn't be impactful outside of Antonio Callaway. Florida's 24/7 site has some additional details. Kadeem Telfort was apparently in the two deep:

Telfort was one of the players that Florida was hoping it could rely on as a key backup at tackle after he enrolled early this spring. He had put together a decent start to fall camp and appeared to be the next guy up at tackle. …Florida's fine if it can stay healthy at tackle against Michigan. If not? Things get dicey very, very quickly.

Quinn Hughes is going to be good. A friend has been taking in the USA WJC camp currently going on in Plymouth and reports back that Hughes already looks like a first-pairing defensemen for them. Michigan Hockey Now interviewed him:

The coaches have certainly noticed his skating abilities – “yeah, I think I’ve always been a pretty good skater” – and his comfort level in all three zones. The fact that he grew up playing forward certainly didn’t hurt.

“I was a forward until I was 13,” Hughes said. “Just because my dad was a D and everyone in my family was a D, so I just wanted to be a D. That’s why.” …

“I think everyone says bigger and stronger, that’s what everyone says, but just get better at everything,” Hughes said. “Even work on my academics – I’m going there as a student-athlete, so to work on my academics as well. I think just overall as a person, as a hockey player, just get better at everything I can.”

Despite being one of the younger players for the U.S., he's had little problem keeping up with the pace. His effortless skating and poise with the puck has been obvious, and he's also played well defensively.

"Definitely the first couple shifts the first game you have to get into it," Hughes said. "By now everyone is pretty much caught up. I feel like I've played really good competition [last season] so it feels kind of the same thing." …

With the U.S. looking to replace No. 1 defenseman Charlie McAvoy (Boston Bruins), Hughes could be in line to absorb some of his ice time.

"Offensively absolutely," U.S. coach Bob Motzko said. "Right now we don't have any concerns. The snapshot we have from this week, we're very excited."

He will instantly be the #1 PP QB and probably on the top pairing. Looking forward to it.

As you may have gleaned from the title, this is the second in a two-part series on the opponents facing Michigan this season. This is the part that has most of the good teams, as well as the worst of all the terrible teams. I'm not sure which of those sounds more interesting.

Penn State

So… how’s things?

Last year: 11-3 (8-1 B1G), B1G Champion, Lost Rose Bowl to USC 52-49

Recap: We did not see that coming. Penn State won their last 8 conference games, beat Wisconsin in the Big Ten Championship Game, and had a 14-point lead in the second half over USC before falling in a wildly entertaining Rose Bowl.

The reason we didn’t see that coming is because Penn State opened 2-2 with a loss to Not-Good-Enough-To-Be-Our-Rival Pitt, a 7-point win over Temple, and a total defenestration at the hands of Michigan. They then squeeked by Minnesota by three points. They then beat Ohio State in a game that Ohio State really, really should have won; Ohio State outplayed them in most respects, but Penn State blocked two kicks, one of which it returned to the house for the winning score. None of this screamed BEST TEAM IN THE BIG TEN, either then or in hindsight.

So where does that leave us for this year? Man, that’s hard to say. Preseason polls have Penn State as somewhere between a top-5 and top-10 team. Michigan fans remember them as the team that put up slightly less resistance than UCF.

When last we saw them: Ah yes, the defenestration.

Michigan outgained Penn State 6.13 yards per play (Penn State’s worst defensive performance prior to the Rose Bowl) to 3.47 yards per play (Penn State’s worst offensive performance of the year by more than a yard per play, and more than 3 yards per play below their season average). The Wolverines didn’t punt in the first half, and they forced a field goal so sad it made Jim Harbaugh want to apologize to the game of football itself.

This team is as frightening as: Don Flamenco from Punch-Out, but when you face him in a rematch in the World Circuit. Everyone’s like ‘oooooh he’s so good now’ and you’re like ‘but this is the same dude I knocked the eff out like five bouts ago how much better could he be?’ Fear Level = 8

Michigan can sleep soundly about: Mike Gesicki, guy who blocks things. Trace McSorley, guy who has to manage games. Penn State’s offensive line when run blocking. Penn State vs. Not Not Michigan.

As for Barkley… nessun dorma, man.

When they play Michigan: Penn State is likely to be 6-0. Can anyone think of the last time Michigan faced a 6-0 Penn State team? Anyone? What if I gave you two extra seconds to think about it? Mario, any thoughts on the subject?

Michigan’s heralded 1993 and 1994 recruiting classes began paying dividends immediately. The 1993-94 Wolverines had three winning streaks of seven games or longer in just a 41-game season, the longest of which reached 11 games. The 1994-95 team took something of a step back—their longest winning streak was only nine games—while still winning 30 games and finishing first in the CCHA.

The most dominant streak of the decade dovetailed with the vaunted recruits becoming upperclassmen. The nature of collegiate hockey scheduling left its mark on previous winning streaks; many took place across multiple road series with neutral-site games sprinkled in. In 1995-96, however, Michigan’s offense hit its stride just as the Wolverines returned home for a six-game homestand at the beginning of January. Their eight-game winning streak started with a GLI title that they took by a combined score of 9-2. They put up even gaudier numbers in front of their own crowd, averaging 9.6 goals per game over six home contests.

The season ended with Michigan’s first national championship in 32 years; before they got there, goalies were pulled, the wooden bleachers creaked and swayed, the crowd beyond the students got involved, and for opponents, the ghosts of Yost were growing louder.

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Brendan Morrison, forward (1993-97): That was an incredible stretch. I think we averaged that month or six weeks or whatever it was, we averaged something ridiculous like 8.7 goals a game or something like that. [Ed. A—They averaged 7.6 goals per game over the ten games from the GLI at the end of December through the end of January and the aforementioned 9.6 goals per game counting just the six-game January homestand.] Just absurd. I know every single home game we played, the other team’s goalie was pulled at some point. I don’t think it was a very fun place for other teams to come in and play. They knew they were walking into kind of the lion’s den there; we were rolling and scoring a bunch of goals. It was intimidating. I remember other programs coming out and verbalizing that it was a tough place to play. It was difficult. It’s almost like with our fans and playing in that arena, it was like you were up 1-0 or 2-0 before the game even started.

Marty Turco, goaltender (1994-98): For me, having us rolling teams, you look at the scores and you’re like rolling teams, yeah, 8-3, 7-2, 10-4. You’re like, Alright. Everybody else was happy except for Red because Red was like, “No one cares because we won and we dominated but how about those two you let in there?” I might not have been needed as much to have the game on the line early and mid-year, but he wanted to make sure I was the guy he thought I was at the end of the year. So it wasn’t all hunky-dory during that year [1995-96] for me in particular but it was huge in terms of growth.

Tim Carmody, student season ticket holder: It was exciting. It was definitely very relevant. People would go all the time. People would show up a little bit later for parties on hockey nights.

[After THE JUMP: the crowd’s creativity, the environment’s advantage, and the quirks of an old barn]

Draftageddon 2017: The Search for the Most Iowa Name Ever

This is Part VIII. We are drafting Big Ten players to give you an overview of the guys and dudes around the conference. You come out of it with a four-deep preseason All-Big Ten. We come out of it knowing the names of Iowa offensive linemen.

Carpenter was 22 of 24 last year and hit some dang bombs. He was 10/10 on 40+ yard field goals, hit both of his attempts from 50+, won the Big Ten kicker of the year award, and finished 9th nationally in FEI's Field Goal Efficiency metric. (This is nominally a team stat, but come on.) PSU's Tyler Davis had an identical hit rate last year but finished just 27th because he wasn't hitting some dang bombs.

He also had an impressive 50% touchback rate and help limit Minnesota KO returns to under 19 yards a pop, second best in the league. I bet he can punt, too!

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Ace: Let the special teams shenanigans commence.

Brian: It's not shenanigan to take a kicker to be a kicker

Ace: You’re foreshadowing the shenanigans, Brian.

Brian: Blame Bryan.

BiSB:I drafted a QB to be a QB. Speaking of which... Conor Sheehy and Clayton Thorson

We’re coming to the Second City! Brian and I will be with the Chicago Club of the Alumni Association of the University of Michigan tomorrow night, joined by former Michigan cornerback Todd Howard, Adam Rittenberg of ESPN, and former Harbaugh bodyman and all-around program dude Zach Eisendrath, who recently founded BigGameAir.com, a private jet company for sports fans.